Atlanta artist brings his own brand of surrealism to Dalí Museum

Atlanta artist and DJ Greg Mike, owner of ABV Gallery in East Atlanta, pays homage to a fellow flamboyant surrealist with an immersive, four-sided mural in an exhibition of street art at The Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida.

On view through Oct. 26, “Outside In: New Murals Inspired by Dalí” is an exhibition featuring works by 12 artists — all veterans of the annual SHINE Mural Festival. Since it debuted in 2015, SHINE has commissioned 180 street murals in St. Petersburg, including two by Mike.

The exhibition was conceived by Allison McCarthy, former curator of The Dalí who serves on SHINE’s steering committee.

“We have a huge amount of cultural tourism here,” she said. “I was like, why don’t we do something fun and bring SHINE muralists inside and have them paint murals that relate to our collection and our architecture?”

“Outside In” serves to expose a larger audience to street art and introduce younger viewers to Dalí. Former SHINE artists were invited to submit proposals for the show. Out of 50 proposals, a dozen were selected, including Mike’s.

“I definitely knew he was a good fit,” said McCarthy.

“Within the context of the global mural street art scene, he’s a really reputable name,” said Jenee Priebe, former SHINE director who worked closely with The Dalí Museum and McCarthy. “I mean, he’s very highly regarded and has a lot of respect within that community.”

The project was a natural one for the artist

“I grew up always loving Dalí’s work,” said Mike, who also counts Keith Haring and Andy Warhol among his influences.

The proposal Mike submitted extolled Dalí’s influence on his own style and vision.

“His work captivated me from a young age, not only for its surreal imagery but for the way it invited viewers to step into a world where the boundaries of reality dissolve,” wrote Mike. “His ability to blend the familiar with the fantastical has deeply influenced my own approach, and with this mural, I aim to channel that same spirit of wonder and imagination.”

In preparation for creating the mural, Mike went deep researching Dalí, listening to podcasts, reading about his life and work and digging into The Dalí’s extensive database.

Given the largest chunk of the Dalí architecture ― a U-shaped room with 18-foot walls on the second floor of the museum ― Mike took advantage of the prime real estate to create an immersive space blending Dalí’s imagery with his own Pop Art-inspired color palette and Larry Loudmouf character.

To make the piece feel immersive, Mike insisted the floor be painted, but that created a logistical problem. The actual museum floor couldn’t be changed, so Mike had to source a vinyl floor covering that could be painted, wouldn’t be slippery, could hold up to foot traffic, and would blend with the painted walls.

The process of sourcing and installing the flooring was not without anxiety, said Mike. It complicated the project’s deadline and presented the challenge of working with an entirely new material.

“I try to be as positive as possible in these situations, because you’re trying things that aren’t typical,” said Mike. “I have never done anything like this but was very excited that I took the risk to do it.”

Mike spent two weeks with a team of three creating the mural in a labor-intensive application of acrylic paint with brushes — a far cry from the fast and loose street artist technique of using spray paint to dash out a design.

The effort has proved worthwhile. Mike’s mural has been especially appealing to audiences, said McCarthy.

“I really think that that’s what hits it out of the park is that I walk into that room, and people are on the ground pretending to swim in the fake pond that he put in,” said McCarthy. “You’re just enveloped by his artwork, and it’s great.”

Visitors are “interacting with his mural in ways that we’re not necessarily seeing with some of the other ones,” echoed Priebe.

Mike’s mural blends familiar motifs from Dalí works, including the melting clocks from one of his most famous paintings, “The Persistence of Memory,” and Dalí’s desolate, dream logic landscapes. Mike also nods to the famous crustacean at the center of Dalí’s surrealist sculpture “Lobster Telephone,” in which the lobster functions as the phone’s receiver.

Those Daliesque references float in the foreground, backdropped by Mike’s Looney Tunes color scheme of vivid oranges, reds and yellows, plus morphing, dripping, cascading, pooling rivers of Windex blue. It’s a work that blends Dalí’s surrealist dreamscapes with the cartoon world of Mike’s vernacular featuring disembodied screaming mouths, psychedelic mushrooms and flowers conveying a general air of merry, mutating mayhem.

“He made it his own,” noted McCarthy. “He took all of these Dalinian symbols of the crutch and the melting objects and the Catalonian landscape that Dalí painted in his background all the time and made it look like just a Greg Mike painting.”

The result illustrates parallels between the two artists.

“Mike’s “psychedelic album-art aesthetic really connects with audiences,” said Peter Tush, curator and senior interpreter for The Dalí Museum. “I think Dalí appeals to this same audience for many of the same reasons — both capture a sense of cosmic mystery, psychic drama, deep secrets and visual fun in an Alice in Wonderland world turned inside out. The Dalí Museum is very proud that Greg is represented in ‘Outside In.’”

McCarthy agreed.

“(Mike’s) a big force in the art world, and he’s doing really cool things in Atlanta. That he took the time out of all that he’s doing to come down and be a part of this show and really elevate it was humbling for me as a curator and really is such a great addition to this exhibition,” she said.